“If the effing Prince found out straightaway that we were visiting,” Gehrig said, “then he’s bloody well had time to station some snipers along the ridge. We’re lucky that’s all. One time he had felled trees across the gap. Lost a wag that time out, and a good dozen men before we fought our way free.”
The van shot by them. The nose of the wag had been altered by adding a triangular battering ram pointing out. It looked like something from a locomotive Ryan had seen.
“We’ve been waiting to try out Betsy,” Gehrig said. “She’s a tough old girl.”
The wags roared up the incline to the gap, pushing the envelope of control. Ryan spotted the collection of logs blocking the juncture. The timber lay in a crisscross fashion like a fence.
“Give him leave,” Gebrig told the driver.
The man laid on the horn, and the rolling squall of it echoed around them. The van driver honked back, then sped up while the jeep dropped back to about four wag lengths.
“They’re waiting up there,” the driver shouted over the grind of machinery. Then one of the first shots punched through the windshield and reduced the corner of Gehrig’s seat to cottony tatters.
The next bullet went in below the machine gunner’s left eye and exited through the back of his head, dumping red-and-gray gore at Ryan’s side. He followed the trajectory of the round and saw green-garbed men clinging to the sheer face of the cliffs above them. Ropes were around them, holding them in place while they fired.
“Sniper!” Gehrig yelled. He lifted a boot and kicked the windshield forward, then brought up a semiautomatic sniper rifle Ryan didn’t recognize. The recoil was obviously tremendous, pushing the man back when he fired.
Pulling himself up, Ryan grabbed the .50-caliber machine gun as it spun on its pintels. He kicked the belt clear, then started firing. Brass flipped from the breech as a line of autofire chewed into the right cliff face and scratched Celt snipers free.
The lead wag smashed into the stack of logs and almost came to a standstill as the rear wheels lifted from the ground because of the impact. The engine roared, and twin rooster tails of dirt, grass, snow and stone spit out across the jeep, caking Gehrig, the driver and Ryan with congealed cold.
A belt jammed in the machine gun. Abandoning it, Ryan took up the Steyr. The wag was almost at a standstill behind the lead vehicle, and he knew they were sitting targets for the Celts.
More of the enemy came from around the trees at the base of the gap. Ryan knew it would be only seconds before they were overrun. He leaned forward and grabbed the driver’s shoulder. “Ram the wag ahead of you, dammit! Give it more weight! Do it now!”
The driver let out the clutch and steered for the back of the wag.
Ryan braced himself as well as he could, but the impact was jarring. Metal buckled on both vehicles, and the jeep’s engine joined the van’s in the rough grunting as eight tires struggled for traction.
Then, almost imperceptibly at first, the wag inched forward, shoving logs out of its way. The driver cut the wheel, following the path of least resistance as the jeep pushed from behind. The weight of the blockage gave way all at one time, and the lead wag skidded along the length of the logs.
Two Celts were almost on the jeep, screaming and firing revolvers.
Ryan whirled and filled his hand with the SIG-Sauer. He fired into the center of both men as the jeep jumped forward and nearly pitched him from the seat. The Celts went down.
The jeep rode the logs hard, slithering along the length for a short time before finding the open area beyond the blockade. It jerked as it smashed against the heavy tree trunks, knocking them out of the way.
The last wag through had no trouble getting past the logs, but several large stones were pushed from the top of one of the cliff faces and came crashing down. Ryan caught sight of the wag taking damage and bouncing from the impacts as he worked the jammed belt in the machine gun free.